Independence Day Fun

I've been trying to get a blog up all week, in fact I've written 4 and whenever I go to post them the internet or website aren't working! i'm determined to make this one work!

Today marks 46 years of "independence" in Zambia. It's a bit of a laugh really as Zambia is actually very dependent on outside aid etc. but I won't get into that now. For the kids, Independence Day means no classes but a whole day of water races and pool games. For the staff it means a whole day of hyper/excited children and a sunburn to keep us awake all night. It is a great day though, and everyone had fun! Of course, my house, Fisher, won the competition and so is still ahead in the running for the trophey at the end of the term. :) still undefeated. :D all the kids did an amazing job and i was very proud of my little 'no sealers' who did awesome despite the fact that they were swimming in water over their heads and only 2 of them can actually make a width of the pool. We have a new King of the plank champion, which is always exciting. unfortunately the staff didn't get to play as we ran out of time. :( the only injury today was to a staff member who dislocated her shoulder in a silly swimming game. oops! the day ended with a MASSIVE bonfire (over 2 stories high) and some great fire works. what a day! unfortunately we've got regular classes tomorrow and the grade 7's start their national exams.... not so great timing for them. not sure if they'll be awake! (pics to come once they're downloaded and if i remember)

today is also the 1/2 way point in our term, craziness! our year will be finished in a little over 5 weeks. i'm not really prepared for all the end of term craziness but i'm excited about going home for hte holidays!!

this week we'll be handing out the scripts for the end of term show. this means that i'll also have to get memorizing as i've got a part in it this year. thankfully no singing for me! :)

last week we had birthday party. i won't go into lots of details but the theme was "circus". it wasn't too bad. i dressed up as a little girl who was going to the circus.

i also held the 'Friday Night' ('late night' fun for 7-9th gr) at my house last week. actually i just had the girls and we did a 'spa/dress-up' night. it was a lot of fun. the girls enjoyed putting on face masks and giving each other pedicures. they also got manicures and enjoyed dressing up in my make up and earings and such and taking tons of pictures. it's so nice to have these 'fun' times with the girls. :)

thanksgiving post (a little late as usual)

Right now back in Canada many people will be celebrating Thanksgiving; eating turkey and such, thinking of the things they are thankful for. Here in Zambia we don’t celebrate Thanksgiving so I had kind of forgotten about it until I noticed some comments on Facebook. So I’ll do a quick list of what I’m thankful for this year:
1) The Lord has allowed me to continue serving Him here at Sakeji
2) All 19 of my students (even the ones that drive me insane occasionally!)
3) The rain! It’s been cooling things down and of course helping my little garden grow!
4) The 22 students who were baptized last term
5) That I’ll be able to go home for a visit at Christmas and see my family!
There are many, many more things to be thankful for as God has given me SO much and continues to astound me with the ways in which He provides for my every need and then some!
Quick update: we’ve just finished our first ½ term break so we’re already 1/3 of the way through the term! Wow! We had some gorgeous sunny days for our break, which of course means all the staff are sporting some nice sunburns (myself included). The first day Lina and I completed our morning duties (try-outs for the end of term program and some supervision duties) and then borrowed a vehicle and took off for Kalene. Lina was on a mission to get some yitenge (cloth) from their market, unfortunately we got there at a bad time and a lot of the shops were closed. Those that were open had a very poor selection. Our next stop was The Rapids, where I spent some time on my birthday. We arrived, changed and were looking for a place to jump in for a swim when this guy came up and told us we had to pay to be there… um.. what??! It’s a public river for goodness sake! Finally the only way to get rid of him was to tell him we were leaving. I was pretty miffed, no swim. :( We found out when we got back that apparently they (whoever ‘they’ are) are now charging a small fee. So stupid! It’s not like there’s upkeep or anything, it’s a RIVER! So we packed up our stuff and headed off, having a bit of a picnic supper on the way home. It was a rather disappointing afternoon and really not worth the cost of renting the vehicle. Oh well, c’est la vie! On Saturday I had swimming supervision (where I earned my burn). After lunch I headed up to my house and spent the afternoon relaxing and sewing. There were 2 staff vs students tag rugby games but I opted out. I had tried to learn the game but it was so ridiculous (not much resembling rugby at all!) and I wasn’t very good at it so it was all quite frustrating. As it was tag rugby I had no way of venting my frustration! so I decided it might be best not to play rather than lose my cool in front of the students! Apparently I wasn’t really needed anyhow as the staff still managed to beat the students. :) overall is seems everyone had a great long weekend and now we’re all buckling down for the next section of the term. Lina, Jill and I need to decided soon who will be getting the main parts and solos etc for our Christmas play and get that ball rolling. Next Wednesday is birthday party and we have a few special guests coming over the next few weeks…. So it should get rather busy soon!
51 days left!

written on Sept 30th but forgot to post till now....

It’s been awhile since I last wrote, not just because I had nothing to say but I haven’t been on the internet all that much. As I write (type) we’re in the middle of our first really big rain of the season. It’s been working up to it for few days/weeks now with little showers here and there, mostly in the night. I think this one will be a ‘gully-washer’ as my friend says. It never ceases to amaze me when we get hail here, but hail there is. I’m just glad that there’s not a long of lightening yet. I prefer the lightning storms at night when I don’t have to be out and about! I’m a little worried about my classroom right now because I think I left the windows open, but I’m not worried enough to go out in this downpour. I’ll check the damage later.
Other happenings since my last blog: sickness, sickness everywhere! It seems the students all came back with some form of cough/cold and decided to share with their teachers; this is not too uncommon. Unfortunately someone also brought in a nasty form of flu which has gone through the ranks as well! Thankfully it’s short-lived, about 48 hrs, but not a fun time for sure! So since the beginning of term I’ve had laringitus (sp?)/cold (which makes teaching interesting) and just when that was clearing up and I was feeling somewhat “normal” again I came down with the flu. The worst part about being sick out here is that there are no substitute teachers to call in! so we try and accommodate each other as much as possible, letting the sick person get as much rest as they can. Thankfully for me my first (and worst) day was on a Wednesday. I suffered through the morning, put on a video, then had my afternoon classes (handwriting and swimming) covered by the current short-termers. Yesterday I managed to slug my way through the day, taking as many naps as I could and going to bed early. Today I’m feeling much better and was actually able to eat meals. Hurray! Of course, now it’s my afternoon off and I’m busy catching up on all the planning and marking that has been piling up for the last 3 days! :S
Well, just as quickly as it started the rain has stopped, the birds are out catching the worms drowning in the puddles and I must head up to my classroom to assess damages…

back in the groove

We have been back at school for a whole week now and I have to say I'm quite impressed with the way my students are adapting to our new schedule of having both grades together all the time. Apart from the classroom being a little louder then I like (which is to be expected), things are working out rather smoothly. It's funny how quickly we fall back into the routines.

My students are currently studying 'animals' in science class and have been keeping my on my toes with some great questions. i however have not been able to answer them all and was wondering if anyone can answer this one:

"How come an oppossum (and bat) can hang upside down and all the blood doesn't rush to it's head like it would in a human?"

The obvious answer is that they're created differently but that wasn't a satisfying answer for them. :S

We also had an interesting discussion today about angels and demons. It's crazy what their little minds can come up with and yet they can't get their minds around (what we might consider) "simple" math or language promblems. Kids sure keep life interesting! :)

Nothing too exciting planned for this week so I might not blog for awhile...

off to a good start!

Our first day went well... for grade 1 & 2 it's really just a reminder of the rules, checking out the "new" things in the classroom (which includes a computer this term... we'll see how long that lasts) and getting to know each other again. It's only 1/2 a day of classes so we spent a lovely afternoon swimming, splashing and generally having fun at the pool and river. the water was freezing but the sun was so warm it felt rather refreshing.:) we ended the day by finishing up the movie "Milo and Otis" which the kids started on Tuesday night. Overall a good day.

Today however is when the real work begins. Right into class work and such this morning. We'll see how it goes having both grades in the classroom at all times...

laughter breaks the silence

The peaceful, relaxing silence has now been replaced with children's laughter and shouts and a sense of excitement. TOday the students are coming back to school and tomorrow begins our third and final term of the 2011 school year.

the past few days i've been busy desparately trying to get my classroom in order (i left it in a bit of a mess) and figuring out my schedule and what i'm teaching etc. of course i could have done that anytime over the past 6 weeks, but i am such a procrastinator that i always leave it till the last minute... praise the Lord it's done now. i'm not fully organized curriculm wise, but that will sort itself out over the next few days. it will be an interesting term in that i'll be teaching all the core classes to both grades. this means that i'll have both grades in the classroom when teaching math, language/phonics, and reading. usually we try to split them up at this time and have one teacher teaching math to one grade while the other grade is having language with another teacher. unfortunately we don't have the staff for that this term. I will be getting some help though as we have 3 more young ladies coming to help out for 6 wks. i've requested one as a TA. I'm not sure who it'll be yet as they don't arrive until Sept 15th. I guess i'll just have to wing-it until then. Another short termer who has come to help out wherever he's needed is Michael Geesey. He's a Sakeji alumni so it's nice that he could make it back for a visit.

Some prayer requests for this term:
1) That my students will work hard and finish the year strong
2) For those who are struggling to get the extra assistance they need
3) That we'll have a great term; that God will give the teacher's the patience and engergy they need and that Christ's love will shine abundantly in our school.

so busy relaxing i forgot to blog!

I have really been enjoying my holiday time this term break. It has been very laid back and relaxing. I have had the time (and energy) to get a lot of little things done that I’ve been wanting to do for awhile but haven’t been able to find the time. Lots of sewing and reading has been caught up on as well as gardening and other ‘pass times’.

The one, I’ll call it “black spot” on my holidays so far was the week I spent in Lunda lessons. Although the lessons were somewhat productive and I actually managed to learn some Lunda grammar and a few phrases; who wants to be taking classes on their holiday! Add to that that I’m “linguistically challenged” (languages do NOT come easily to me) and I was pretty miserable that week; that and the bumping around in the car for an hour each day on the way to and from Kalene. However, I keep telling myself that it was a good grounding and now I just need to keep practicing so that eventually, one Sunday I’ll go into church here and actually understand the sermon without a translator or I’ll be able to talk to my gardener in Lunda so he knows that weeding does not involve ripping out everything in the garden, just the weeds!

Speaking of gardens, I’m quite proud of how my little one is coming along. I even remember to water it a few times a week. This is mainly because I’m afraid of what my students would do if they found out that I let the pea plants that they planted die while they were away. (we studied plants last term). They will be so excited to see how much their little plants have grown…. Ok, I admit I’m kind of excited about it too. :)

Even more exciting then that though was when the container boxes arrived yesterday! Lina got her’s first so I went over to her house and oohhed and aaahhed as she opened hers. Then I went home and opened mine. For me it’s like Christmas and birthdays all wrapped up in dirty cardboard boxes. Pieces of home and love sent over in the form of t.p,, p.b and homemade preserves (among other things). Each missionary has their own method for the opening/sorting etc of boxes. Mine is: divide and conquer! I open all the boxes sorting/spreading the stuff all over the floor as I go; much like Christmas. Then once the excitement has died down do I start finding places to put everything. As this is not quite as exciting it can take me a few days to complete. Others are more “organized” in their approach and open and box and put the items all away before moving on to the next box. Although I see the “benefits” to this (mainly having space to move in the house) I just don’t find it exciting enough. It reminds me too much of my days in retail which I would rather forget.

Before I forget, I want to send out a huge “THANK YOU” to everyone who participated and donated to the getting these boxes to me. I don’t know how to thank you enough! Ok, a quick ‘favourites’ list and then I must get back to putting things away.

Favourite item: I think I’m gonna have to go with the wild mushroom mix, haven’t tried it yet but am so excited about it as I haven’t had mushrooms in ages!

Most useful item: well that’s gonna be a toss up between the printer and the bright yellow rain jacket; both will be used a LOT this term

Funniest item: the “singing” flag…not sure who put that in (I’m thinking one of my family members) but Lina and I had a good laugh. :)

Most ‘home-like’ item: mom’s preserves. Looking forward to that taste of home!

Well, that’s it for now. Must get the house back in order as next week I’m back in my classroom sorting that all out. Only a week and a bit left till the kids come back… I think I’m actually beginning to miss them…